If you care, (which you probably don’t, but I’m going to tell you anyway) this is how:

1. Pick a laundry basket of kale, clean, de-stem.
2. Run kale through the food processor using the slicing disc.
3. Cram shredded kale into a Mason jar. (I’m using quart jars.) This might be more successful with plastic freezer bags, but I’m terrified of keeping food in plastic for months.
4. You can fit a SHOCKING amount of kale into one jar. An overflowing laundry basket will yield maybe 2 1/2 packed Mason jars… I’m not sure how!
5. Now for the interesting part. I use this vacuum sealer Mason jar attachment… (attachment for this machine) air is the enemy when freezing things; it’s how you end up with freezer burn.
6. I can only get it to work 0% of the time. But Paul has better luck at around 50% of the time. So he is in charge of sealing the jars… sometimes he gets on the first try, sometimes he has to do it four times.
7. Add the screw lid and put it into the freezer.

We froze raw tomatoes last year and they were AMAZING. It was so much simpler than canning. Whenever we had a batch of extra tomatoes, I put them in the food processor and liquefied them. Then I froze the whole thing… I have no idea why people are so put off by skins, seeds, etc… IT ALL TASTES LIKE TOMATOES.

We froze an enormous amount and they took me through April of this year! I used the last of them and they were still delicious! Of course, raw kale is very different than freezing a block of liquid. We’ll see how it goes.

***What I’m reading:

We Animals, by Jo-Anne McArthur… I’m revisiting this book because I signed up to be a patron for Jo-Anne McArthur… she is doing amazing photojournalism work, documenting animals in the human environment.

She gives her photographs without charge, to organizations working to end animal suffering in all forms— from bullfighting to factory farms to zoos.

Her work is the subject of the documentary The Ghosts In Our Machine … at one part she she says, “the hardest part is leaving them behind.”

Wecan help to NOT LEAVE THEM BEHIND. We can choose to NOT turn our faces away and say, oh that’s too sad… we must evolve to understand that it is not enough to profess love and compassion while doing nothing… we MUST ALSO ENGAGE.

I also read:

A Little Life, by Hanya Yanagihara… I don’t know if I’m recommending this book. Her creativity is astounding. She writes despair magnificently. I did not anticipate any of the places she took the story.

But it took me forever to get into.

Seeing as how there is no limit to the generosity of my soul, I will offer the winner of The National Book Award this editing advice: you did not need the first third of your book.

When humans use insecticide, it does not just kill the bugs we don’t like— it kills all insects, including honeybees, butterflies and ladybugs.

THEN, after spraying, the insects do not simply disappear off the face of the earth… many live a short time before they die, and in this time, they may be consumed by natural predators like songbirds, small mammals and other insects.

Pesticides may have a deadly toxicity to these predators… or they may build up in their fat or blood and cause illness or death over time… time in which they might become part of the food chain, further spreading the toxins.

Even so-called “green” chemicals are still intended to kill, and though they may be derived from natural sources or biodegrade quickly, they are still highly toxic to you and other organisms.

Furthermore, rain or irrigation runoff can carry pesticides down roads to storm drains that lead directly to nearby streams, ponds, lakes… AND water carrying pesticides can leach or percolate into the soil, contaminate groundwater.

Our actions have consequences to animals and our environment! It is vital that we do not go blindly into the world, but make ourselves informed and educated!

Considering the steady decline of bird populations and the utter devastation of pollinator populations, it is WAY PAST TIME that we humans take a serious, proactive look at the choices we make and the practices we support – either directly or indirectly.

Resources to learn more:

Neonicotinoids— the most widely used insecticides—are found in hundreds of household products. Shockingly, concentrations of insecticides sold for residential use contain as much as 30 times the chemical load allowed in the agricultural sector. — Dr. Pierre Mineau

Neonicotinoid contamination levels in both surface- and ground water in the United States and around the world are already beyond the threshold found to kill many aquatic invertebrates.– American Bird Conservancy

Rodenticides pose a significant risk to bobcats, foxes, owls, and other animals that are apt to eat poisoned rats or mice… The d-CON company is carrying out unprecedented stalling tactics while their poisons continue to cause gruesome deaths in hawks, owls, eagles and other raptors, as well as in dogs and cats. — American Bird Conservancy

Scotts Miracle-Gro* fined $12.5 million for illegally applying insecticides to its wild bird food products—insecticides that are toxic to birds. It also falsified pesticide registration documents and distributed pesticides with misleading and unapproved labels. — audubon.org

*incase you needed another reason to NEVER BUY MIRACLE GRO.

***Random stuff I’m up to:
I had some horrible blog issues last week exciting opportunities to learn about technology!

While I was at it, I made some other changes and updates (like a page of books I love)… If you find anything broken/not working as it should, I would really appreciate a heads-up!

Also, I am embarrassed to tell you this: I started a shop my Instagram page; so that eventually I can transition to being a fashion blogger and fulfill my dream of not writing any text, and just playing dress up.

I do understand that I am horribly old for this. But I have been late to every other life goal… Must I give up my dreams just because I am slow?

Also, I have stupendous taste.

ALSO, I’m tired of seeing SO MUCH animal skin on Instagram fashion accounts… Paying thousands of dollars for a handbag is already dumb enough, encouraging other people to do the same is dumber still. But SURELY, surely we can make poor budgeting decisions without the suffering of animals? Misery is not fashionable!

Yet another thing I must fix about the world.

Elvis is planning a big celebration for Paul this weekend: she will open him a can of wet food and also permit him to borrow her fuzzy ball.

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52 Comments

I subscribed to you because I too love the Free section of Craigslist and was delighted to have my obsession justified by a complete stranger on the other side of the country via a hilarious blog.

But I am BEYOND THE MOON to learn that you are also vegan and aren’t afraid to use your furniture related blog as a platform to speak on pressing animal suffering issues. Leather, wool and silk are not a part of my life because they don’t need to be and I’m also tired of seeing these fashion bloggers promote those products when there are so many alternatives (samsies for meat and dairy products – hello Gardein and cashew cheese. Get on my level, world) BRAVO and keep up your great work.

We’re learning to garden. It’s my first real yard, and a whole 2 udsa zones from the rest of my gardening attempts, so it’s trial and error, mostly error. My idea for the kitchen yard is to cage it in with small gauge carpenters cloth, to keep the predators out, but I’ve no idea if that is practical or not. The lady from the plant store is supposed to come out to consult and tell me where to put things [or not to put them]. Everything is in planters for now, since even weeds don’t do well in our yard. I’m also looking for ground cover that isn’t grass. I keep looking at stuff that grows in the cracks of parking lots for something that isn’t ugly, or too tall. Because if it isn’t pretty, doesn’t smell good, or I cant eat it I don’t want to exert the effort on it.

I cannot tell you what a kindred soul I have found in you!!! I started reading your blog because I found the relationship you have with Paul to be so wonderful and funny and I love how he tolerates your craziness – it reminds me of my own husband – but now that you are encouraging empathy and action against the animals that share this earth with us and suffer because of our actions – I have yet another reason to devour your posts!!! Please do not stop fighting against animal suffering! I am so happy you are getting your beautiful message across to such a wide audience! Thank you thank you thank you!!!!!

Our development.3,800 homes, first PUD in American begun in the seventies-zoned in on a homeowner who had the nerve to plant veggies in his front yard instead of grass-ya know for like his herd of grazing farm animals. That got so much flack that they backed off and allowed? him a modified front planting area but it had to be ….like…. attractive…cause the heavens might fall if it looked a little scraggly. Is there a ground cover that looks similar to grass but doesn’t need a nursemaid and big bucks to look good.

My almost 20 year old asked me about a month ago why our grass wasn’t as green and pretty as all of our neighbors. I told her it was because we chose not to poison our weeds since it also poisons the bugs and the birds that eat them! She was cool with that and I just tell our neighbors that our dull green grass just makes theirs look better to everyone else…so we are doing them a favor by not fertilizing! (I also hand pick those nasty, ugly tomato bugs off our tomato plants rather than putting poison on the food we are going to eat.)

I think we could be kindred spirits like Anne of Green Gables and Diana Berry… Just think! We could drink raspberry cordial while freezing tomatoes and dressing up like princesses and searching for buried treasure in our 1890 house attic. Please come to Denver and help convince my husband that Craigslist is a GOOD thing!

To freeze tomatoes you can just wash, dry and freeze them whole. I do them on cookie sheets or in cake pans until hard and then transfer to bags. The skin protects them from freezer burn, the skin slips off when they are defrosted and the texture is much like cooked but with a much fresher taste.

I don’t understand why a vegan wouldn’t use wool. Or the objection to raw milk from grass fed cows or eggs from pastured chickens. I can’t get a reasonable answer from two vegan nieces, who equate factory farming with the organic farm where we buy most of our food, and where I know how the cows and chickens live. Can you tell me why vegans object to carefully sourced animal products that do not require animal suffering or death?

hi Kay!! i’m a rather new vegan so I’m going to do my best to answer you! Wool is not completely free of animal suffering. Often times it is ripped off their bodies in the shearing process and they are kicked and beaten. PETA has secretly filmed sheep and bleeding on the floor as they are funneled through a mass shearing process. Ultimately, once they have declined in wool production, they are shipped off to slaughter. Here is a much better description than I just gave you: http://www.peta.org/living/fashion/whats-wrong-wool/

As for carefully sourced milk and eggs – the key word is ‘carefully’. Many vegans shun all animal products I think because it’s easier. There is no way you can “mess up” by sourcing incorrectly. As someone who is a vegan for animal suffering reasons only, I am ok with VERY carefully sourced eggs -but milk was meant for baby cows. If you are drinking it – there is a baby out there that’s not getting it. Technically, it was meant for a bovine, not a human – so it doesn’t even make sense to me. In order to even produce milk, no matter how carefully sourced, a cow will have to be pregnant. Dairy cows suffer a life of constant pregnancy and birth, no matter how well cared for on an ‘organic farm’. They are impregnated over and over again, so they can continue to produce milk.

I’m sorry to all vegans out there if I didn’t get this right – and I thank Kay for asking the question! I hope I was able to help! I welcome any corrections!! 🙂

the questions above are what bother me also. When my sons went through their ewwwe… stage about eating meat I had to inform them that the first thing we humans would have to do is kill billions of animals raised to be food cause who is going to feed and care for them when it’s no longer profitable?

I guess we would have to maintain a supply for all of the predator animals in the wild and zoos etc. I have never eaten much meat but I cooked a meat starch vegetable diet for my family. There is a wonderful autistic woman who developed more humane methods of raising cattle , Grandin? Jennifer?

I wish we prospered with just sunshine, water and fresh air-the whole eating,peeing defecating system seems downright unseemly, but there you are and we’re stuck with it until they come up with the one a day nourishment capsule.

Also I think its very sad that we keep buying things like the apple phones made by virtually slave labor and that’s humans being used and horribly abused. We ought to make our own stuff, if for no other reason than defense against countries that have more and more power over us as we become more and more dependent on them for every darn product we own-from the car in the driveway to our clothes,furniture,electronics-dishes ,pots and pans-I swear I can’t find one thing in my home that doesn’t say made in China.

Imagine if the huge container ships stopped chugging across the Pacific and into all the Seaports of America. The stores would empty in days if not hours in the ensuing panic. And then what would we pay for products? Because our capacity to make much of anything is gone Baby gone!
Scary… And the two motives for foreign manufacturing. You don’t have to provide a safe work place or reasonable hours and you can beat and starve the workers who are not productive enough.

You are not regulated on the crap you pump into the air or the poison you dump into the water. Greed and profit makes todays World go around and it doesn’t have to be this way.
Many have just stopped buying and that’s why China is not experiencing exponential growth recently. Halleluiah! Sorry this is so verbose. I’m old and my time is at most a few years and I wish we could live up to our promise as a Nation. Simply- With Liberty And Justice For All. An honorable Creed and one to make us all proud. Beware when a blogger mounts her soapbox – she will find she has lots of company! You are all lovely kind people and I wish you all a long and Happy life. Vebs’ followers give me great Hope for the future of Mankind and our Beautiful Planet.

So I have an abundance of kale this year too. So I have actually been selling some to a local restaurant and they told me that their kale freezes sometimes (it is pre-cut in large bags when they don’t have local kale). Anyhow, it got me thinking that maybe I should be doing the same. It has been nice to sell some because it paid for all the plants that I put into my garden and such, but now I am going to try and freeze a little. I love that I read this too…just to further my decision that I will be freezing raw kale too. Woot Woot.

I have never been afraid of tomato seeds or the skin of tomatoes. Just this past week on NPR (The Splendid Table show I think?) a post was done taste difference when tomato seeds are in the sauce and a sauce without the seeds. The outcome is that people preferred the taste of the sauce with the seeds. I am on the side of nature and vote for keeping food as close to how nature grows it because they (Nature Elf Cooks) know better. When have I ever made a tomato from scratch?

I have been on the pesticides soapbox for years. I have told anyone who will listen that calling a company like “ChemLawn” (what a name!!) to take care of your property is like committing suicide slowly while watching everything else die, except worthless grass, around you. Where do people think the poisons go? Duh! Into the groundwater we need to drink. Funny how I don’t get invited to parties…..LOL. I have lived in my house for 15 years and have never once used a pesticide. We don’t have fleas, we don’t have insect problems that can’t be solved by ladybugs, and I have an extensive butterfly/bird/bee friendly back yard. The front yard, as long as it is kept mowed, is green. It sure isn’t grass, but it is green, which is enough for where I live, but not for most homeowner’s Nazi associations. A lot of the time I just sit and wonder how the human race has survived for as long as it has.